Our loyal contributor Freyas is going to be providing us with an ongoing series of "theme builds". These builds will take a look at the odd concepts or underused skills in the game by showcasing them in a character build designed to maximize their potential. And here's the thread where you can talk about htem or post your suggestions and requests of Freyas.
Freyas kicks things off with his first theme build. This time around he's working on a Monk/Mesmer with Blessed Aura (Divine Favor), a skill that increases the duration of the enchantments you cast. You can also learn about the ins and outs of the elite skill Peace and Harmony (Divine Favor), something that's become a favorite of many primary Monks lately. You can check out this great article right here.
And, as Freyas says, if you've got any concepts or skills you'd like to see discussed in the future, feel free to lets us know.
Freyas's Theme Builds
Sausaletus Rex
Narcism
This is definitely a column I'd like to read about and get others read. People who call skills useless usually don't know how they can be used effectively or in a strategy.
Freyas, may I suggest Grenth's Balance
Freyas, may I suggest Grenth's Balance
Sicarius Eneco
Very usefull, should be great for people who are not sure about what proffesions/skills to go for and for people willing to improve their build.
Go Freyas Go !
Go Freyas Go !
Sausaletus Rex
I, obviously, really liked the article. As has been said, it should prove very useful and hopefully open up some more possibilities for people.
I'm sure Ensign will drop by and ellucidate all of us with his theory that there will only be 15 playable skills or whatever but at this point those 15 skills are still in question. The game, the metagame, is still in infancy so there's a lot to be said for not following the pack and looking into the "odd" ideas. A skill can be underused because it's suboptimal but also because people just haven't "got" it yet. After all, who was really advocating using Healing Hands before the WPE?
Anyhow, my first reaction to Freyas's builds and, indeed, to Blessed Aura was that enchantment removal would destroy it. However, given the current state of enchantment removal, that's really not that much of a concern. And, as Freyas says here :
Quote:
Originally Posted by Freyas
I'm sure Ensign will drop by and ellucidate all of us with his theory that there will only be 15 playable skills or whatever but at this point those 15 skills are still in question. The game, the metagame, is still in infancy so there's a lot to be said for not following the pack and looking into the "odd" ideas. A skill can be underused because it's suboptimal but also because people just haven't "got" it yet. After all, who was really advocating using Healing Hands before the WPE?
Anyhow, my first reaction to Freyas's builds and, indeed, to Blessed Aura was that enchantment removal would destroy it. However, given the current state of enchantment removal, that's really not that much of a concern. And, as Freyas says here :
Quote:
I'm skeptical of Energy Tap on the second, Protection-centric, build of Freyas's, though. I've always found it hard as a healer to split my attention like that, it's not Power Drain where you'll need to pick your spot (And I know Freyas doesn't mind using that one, either, but he's used to it by now.), but it does require you to find an enemy target and spend those few seconds getting that energy. That's time and attention diverted from keeping your team alive which you might not be able to spare. I'd much rather work with a BiPer who can keep me in energy while I keep defending.
Uthar
Pardon me if this seems a knuckleheaded thing to ask, but in my experience, most skills that say 'target ally gains +1 Energy regeneration' mean that- A target ally, and not yourself. Of course, I have not tested Peace and Harmony, so I don't know. But usually, when I see the phrase 'Target ally', I think "Oh that's only for other people, that's no good unless there's another Monk".
But if you've done this, then I've got no problem taking your word for it.
No wait, never mind. I just found Protective Spirit, which has the same phrase, and I remember being able to cast that on myself.
So please ignore the mad ravings above.
But if you've done this, then I've got no problem taking your word for it.
No wait, never mind. I just found Protective Spirit, which has the same phrase, and I remember being able to cast that on myself.
So please ignore the mad ravings above.
Sausaletus Rex
Quote:
Originally Posted by Uthar
Pardon me if this seems a knuckleheaded thing to ask, but in my experience, most skills that say 'target ally gains +1 Energy regeneration' mean that- A target ally, and not yourself. Of course, I have not tested Peace and Harmony, so I don't know. But usually, when I see the phrase 'Target ally', I think "Oh that's only for other people, that's no good unless there's another Monk".
A common misconception. Skills that "target ally" mean that you can cast them on any friendly character on the field whether that's a member of your team or an NPC but that also includes being able to cast it upon yourself. It's "target other ally" skills that can't be self cast. While "target self" skills...well, I think that's self-explanatory.
Hmmm...I smell a Q&A thread...
Hmmm...I smell a Q&A thread...
Uthar
D'oh! Now I really do feel like a knucklehead.
Ah well, thanks for the enlightenment.
Ah well, thanks for the enlightenment.
Dragou Du Porzan
I really love this Mo/Me build; I was moving towards something similar to this during the last beta, and now I have a more precise template to test out. I only have one concern: there's no space for a resurrect. That wouldn't be a problem in a guild situation when you could consult with your team ahead of time and plan on someone else carrying it, but in your typical pick-up group people are going to be expecting resurrection services from a monk.
So my question is: which of these skills would you drop if you felt you just had to bring along a resurrect? Inspired Hex? Too much risk of running out of energy to drop it, I'd guess. OoH doesn't benefit from the DF spells, but without it you're going to have a heck of a time keeping yourself alive. I'd say Vigorous Spirit would be the one to drop, but as Freyas points out its value (aside from the healing, of course) is in defeating enchantment removal. This build is so tight, it's difficult to figure out what to cut. What would you suggest?
So my question is: which of these skills would you drop if you felt you just had to bring along a resurrect? Inspired Hex? Too much risk of running out of energy to drop it, I'd guess. OoH doesn't benefit from the DF spells, but without it you're going to have a heck of a time keeping yourself alive. I'd say Vigorous Spirit would be the one to drop, but as Freyas points out its value (aside from the healing, of course) is in defeating enchantment removal. This build is so tight, it's difficult to figure out what to cut. What would you suggest?
Freyas
Well, I would probably drop either vigorous spirit or inspired hex, as you said. Inspired hex has the advantage of giving you a small amount of extra energy, but if there's some other hex removal on your team, this would probably be my first choice to sub out. If you've got several monks(3+) on your team, I would consider dropping orison of healing. Vigorous Spirit does benefit from Blessed Aura, and it both has the benefits of being a pretty nice healing enchantment for it's energy cost, and it helps protect your other enchantments. If you cast it on a warrior who's attacking with a sword, vigorous spirit will heal for about 8.3 health a second for it's duration. Likewise, on a character casting quick spells such as another healer using orison and word of healing, you can get similar healing abilities from it. However, when compared to the amount of healing that you'll get from your other enchantments, it pales in comparison. For example, healing breeze will heal for 18 health per second for 10 seconds- in the long run, vigorous spirit will overcome healing breeze, but when you're healing, you're more likely to need fast healing over long-term healing.
The other thing to consider is if you're going to be playing the character PvP versus PvE. In PvE, hex removal is not generally imperative, as most monsters will not use more than one or two hexes, which generally won't hinder your team too much if they aren't removed. In PvE, I would definately trade out inspired hex for a resurrect. For PvP, you're more likely to need hex removal, so I would probably consider removing either orison or vigorous spirit, depending on your team composition.
The other thing to consider is if you're going to be playing the character PvP versus PvE. In PvE, hex removal is not generally imperative, as most monsters will not use more than one or two hexes, which generally won't hinder your team too much if they aren't removed. In PvE, I would definately trade out inspired hex for a resurrect. For PvP, you're more likely to need hex removal, so I would probably consider removing either orison or vigorous spirit, depending on your team composition.
Dragou Du Porzan
That sounds about right. Inspired Hex would definitely get the axe if you need rez in PvE. Best case for PvP is you've got a trusted monk or two along with you who'll handle the team's rezzing needs.
Here is another thought: what about substituting Aura of Faith (DF) in for Peace and Harmony? Coupled with Blessed Aura, AoF would be providing an extra 45% to all your heals on the target ally for 78 seconds. As an added bonus you'd be able to target enemies for attacks, something you can't do with P&H running (that would let you substitute the more aggressive Power Drain in for Inspired Hex if you wanted to go the caster-hate route). Of course you'd be losing the extra pip provided by P&H, but I suppose that could be countered by certain item benefits. Or the slack could be picked up by a Necro wielding BiP. In general, though, do you think this build could handle the loss of P&H's extra pip, or would that just be asking for constant energy shortages?
In a PvP situation where you have a teammate that can be relied on to provide you healing, I can see a good deal of potential in a build that swaps out P&H for AoF and OoH for Power Drain. That would give you two sources of energy recovery, the ability to attack and the ability to throw off enemy spell casters. I certainly wouldn't do this with any old pick-up group, but it could be good with a coordinated effort. Any thoughts?
Question regarding Aura of Faith: does that extra 45% affect other teammates' heals on the target or just your own? Also, I assume it works as well for healing over time spells like Vigorous Spirit, correct (i.e. that warrior is getting healed an extra 45% every time he swings his weapon)?
Here is another thought: what about substituting Aura of Faith (DF) in for Peace and Harmony? Coupled with Blessed Aura, AoF would be providing an extra 45% to all your heals on the target ally for 78 seconds. As an added bonus you'd be able to target enemies for attacks, something you can't do with P&H running (that would let you substitute the more aggressive Power Drain in for Inspired Hex if you wanted to go the caster-hate route). Of course you'd be losing the extra pip provided by P&H, but I suppose that could be countered by certain item benefits. Or the slack could be picked up by a Necro wielding BiP. In general, though, do you think this build could handle the loss of P&H's extra pip, or would that just be asking for constant energy shortages?
In a PvP situation where you have a teammate that can be relied on to provide you healing, I can see a good deal of potential in a build that swaps out P&H for AoF and OoH for Power Drain. That would give you two sources of energy recovery, the ability to attack and the ability to throw off enemy spell casters. I certainly wouldn't do this with any old pick-up group, but it could be good with a coordinated effort. Any thoughts?
Question regarding Aura of Faith: does that extra 45% affect other teammates' heals on the target or just your own? Also, I assume it works as well for healing over time spells like Vigorous Spirit, correct (i.e. that warrior is getting healed an extra 45% every time he swings his weapon)?
Sausaletus Rex
Freyas's next theme build is now up here. This time around he taes you through the entire progress of making a build centered around Fragility (Illusion Magic) from start to finish. Fragility is one of those conditional damage dealing Mesmer skills which, when used right, can deliver a lot of damage and the build Freyas comes up with certainly achieves that. Who said Mesmers can't dish damage?
Jak o
Have this fragility build been tested?
Because I am a little suspicius if it will actually work for the very simple but very importent fact, that "on fire" is not a counted as a condition. At least not if you look at the skill Mend Ailment:
Remove one negative Condition (Poison, Disease, Blindness, Dazed, Bleeding, Crippled, or Deep Wound) from target other ally. That ally is healed 5..57 Health, for each remaining Condition.
Here it says negative condition, but "on fire" isn't included in the description.
Because I am a little suspicius if it will actually work for the very simple but very importent fact, that "on fire" is not a counted as a condition. At least not if you look at the skill Mend Ailment:
Remove one negative Condition (Poison, Disease, Blindness, Dazed, Bleeding, Crippled, or Deep Wound) from target other ally. That ally is healed 5..57 Health, for each remaining Condition.
Here it says negative condition, but "on fire" isn't included in the description.
Sausaletus Rex
Although I can't say anything officially or up-to-date (Not a big deal, you can try it out yourself in...three days.) I think it's been fairly well confirmed that "On Fire" is indeed a condition and triggers Fragility and other condition affecting skills. As for Mend Ailment, don't always trust a skill description. They're far from accurate or finalized yet.
Sleeky101
The fragility build looks pretty solid, but I definitely question not going ele/mes with something like-
12 Illusion
10 Inspiration
8+1 Energy Storage
2 Fire
The hit to fragility makes it a little bit less lethal, but the energy bar increase imo more than makes up for that.
12 Illusion
10 Inspiration
8+1 Energy Storage
2 Fire
The hit to fragility makes it a little bit less lethal, but the energy bar increase imo more than makes up for that.
Dreamsmith
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sleeky101
The hit to fragility makes it a little bit less lethal, but the energy bar increase imo more than makes up for that.
I'd be more concerned about the hit to Inspiration Magic. Getting a few extra points of energy at the start of the battle is definately not worth sacrificing all that mana later on. Not to mention the loss of the better armor.
Pharalon
Personally, I always find a Ranger/Mes to be a much more robust option for a Fragility build. Generally, it requires very little change to a standard Ranger build, just the addition of Fragility and Incendiary arrows, You'll generally already have 2-3 other condition causing skills in your bar, have far superior armor, and still remain very effective even in the face of good hex removal.
Sleeky101
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dreamsmith
I'd be more concerned about the hit to Inspiration Magic. Getting a few extra points of energy at the start of the battle is definately not worth sacrificing all that mana later on.
3*10= 30
Net gain power drain @13 – net gain power drain @ 10 = 6
Net gain energy [email protected] – net gain energy drain@ 10 = 3
Recharge:
Power drain- 25seconds
Energy drain- 20seconds
You wouldn’t get the energy back until 1 min. 20 sec. mark (4th cast of energy drain) and you would break 30en at 1min 40sec, assuming you used the skills asap. It is probably more of a toss up energy wise than what I first assumed.
**EDIT-Possibly looking at how many times you can do the fragility/mark at the start of a fight with 30 extra energy opposed to the energy over time could be the deciding factor. I guess I like frontloading a little bit more than most.
**EDIT AGAIN: Mark's recast time makes frontloading a non-factor. Bleh.
Net gain power drain @13 – net gain power drain @ 10 = 6
Net gain energy [email protected] – net gain energy drain@ 10 = 3
Recharge:
Power drain- 25seconds
Energy drain- 20seconds
You wouldn’t get the energy back until 1 min. 20 sec. mark (4th cast of energy drain) and you would break 30en at 1min 40sec, assuming you used the skills asap. It is probably more of a toss up energy wise than what I first assumed.
**EDIT-Possibly looking at how many times you can do the fragility/mark at the start of a fight with 30 extra energy opposed to the energy over time could be the deciding factor. I guess I like frontloading a little bit more than most.
**EDIT AGAIN: Mark's recast time makes frontloading a non-factor. Bleh.
Bobangry
That first Mo/Me build (Healing Prarys / Divine Favor) is errily similar to a build I was working on. Same skill point distribution and 6 of the same skills.
Blessed Aura , Peace and Harmony , Healing Breeze , Healing Seed , Vigorous Spirit , Orison of Healing . I would have put Divine Spirit on him too (infact I think I did have it on him for awhile) but my guild was pretty harsh in their assessment of that spell. The only real difference is that I was toying with Leech Signet for a slight mana regen. I put a BiP in the group too though so it isn't 100% neccessary. Actually it might even hurt because it would take off my Peace and Harmony making me recast it for 5 mana...or since it's a signet would it not count as a spell?...damn, now you are making me think.
I love the build, and having you do an article on it made my buddy think twice about how critical he was on it. (he went right to his Team Builder and made it but put in channeling instead of Inspired Hex for mana regen) Ah the joy of being right. I'm looking forward to your continued series. 
Blessed Aura , Peace and Harmony , Healing Breeze , Healing Seed , Vigorous Spirit , Orison of Healing . I would have put Divine Spirit on him too (infact I think I did have it on him for awhile) but my guild was pretty harsh in their assessment of that spell. The only real difference is that I was toying with Leech Signet for a slight mana regen. I put a BiP in the group too though so it isn't 100% neccessary. Actually it might even hurt because it would take off my Peace and Harmony making me recast it for 5 mana...or since it's a signet would it not count as a spell?...damn, now you are making me think.
I love the build, and having you do an article on it made my buddy think twice about how critical he was on it. (he went right to his Team Builder and made it but put in channeling instead of Inspired Hex for mana regen) Ah the joy of being right.
I'm looking forward to your continued series.
Freyas
Incendiary Arrows could work well with Fragility as well, given a low Wilderness Survival attribute in order to keep you burn duration down to 1 second. The difficulty I see is that most bows have a 2 second or greater firing rate, meaning you'd only be able to trigger incendiary arrows at most 4 times during the 8 second duration of the preparation. Mark of Rodgort lasts 10 seconds, and wands attack faster, giving an additional 2-3 attacks that trigger burning. The ranger would have access to poison and cripple fairly easily, which could make up for the reduced triggers from burning. My biggest concern with having a ranger primary for a Fragility-based build, however, is energy- with the lower energy pool, you'll have a hard time getting the energy to use too many of your skills(though expertise would help), and keeping up Fragility- A ranger starts with 25 energy and 3 arrows of regeneration- your natural regen will give you just a little more energy than required to keep casting Fragility every 20 seconds or so, leaving you little energy to use any other skills to help inflict conditions.
Overall, I'd say a R/Me Fragility build would be viable- you'd lose some efficiency in dealing damage via Fragility, but you can be more effective in the face of hex removal.
I chose Mo/E rather than E/Mo due to the easier ability to keep going with Fragility, as well as the increased effectiveness of Fragility and the Inspiration skills. Having an Elementalist primary gives you access to a larger energy pool, but without the energy management to keep using the skills, you'll reach a point where you will need to sit around and recharge. Since the Me/E build should be able to continue using their skills when they recharge, the extra energy is not really needed. The key point for deciding is that the build isn't limited by energy regeneration(with the energy management skills), but rather by recharge times- an Elementalist won't be able to spam out the damage faster. However, if you wanted to make an E/Me to use fragility, you could use Enervating Charge and Blinding Flash to get some more frontloaded damage, at the cost of having some down-time later on where you'll need to regenerate energy.
"On Fire" is considered a condition, though as Saus said, I can't be specific on things in the Alpha. The skills and skill descriptions are subject to change without notice, and I'm not allowed to talk about changes in the alpha, so in general, I make these builds by looking at the descriptions on the site. However, if I'm unsure about if something does in fact work, I do double-check that they do work before posting about them.
Overall, I'd say a R/Me Fragility build would be viable- you'd lose some efficiency in dealing damage via Fragility, but you can be more effective in the face of hex removal.
I chose Mo/E rather than E/Mo due to the easier ability to keep going with Fragility, as well as the increased effectiveness of Fragility and the Inspiration skills. Having an Elementalist primary gives you access to a larger energy pool, but without the energy management to keep using the skills, you'll reach a point where you will need to sit around and recharge. Since the Me/E build should be able to continue using their skills when they recharge, the extra energy is not really needed. The key point for deciding is that the build isn't limited by energy regeneration(with the energy management skills), but rather by recharge times- an Elementalist won't be able to spam out the damage faster. However, if you wanted to make an E/Me to use fragility, you could use Enervating Charge and Blinding Flash to get some more frontloaded damage, at the cost of having some down-time later on where you'll need to regenerate energy.
"On Fire" is considered a condition, though as Saus said, I can't be specific on things in the Alpha. The skills and skill descriptions are subject to change without notice, and I'm not allowed to talk about changes in the alpha, so in general, I make these builds by looking at the descriptions on the site. However, if I'm unsure about if something does in fact work, I do double-check that they do work before posting about them.
Pharalon
Quote:
Originally Posted by Freyas
Quote: Originally Posted by Freyas My biggest concern with having a ranger primary for a Fragility-based build, however, is energy- with the lower energy pool, you'll have a hard time getting the energy to use too many of your skills(though expertise would help), and keeping up Fragility- A ranger starts with 25 energy and 3 arrows of regeneration- your natural regen will give you just a little more energy than required to keep casting Fragility every 20 seconds or so, leaving you little energy to use any other skills to help inflict conditions. This is the main drawback with taking the ran/mes over a mes/el. You need to a little more judicious with your energy usage, and probably have to spread yourself out over 4 attribute lines if you want to be effective in more than short bursts.
Quote:
That's nice, but:|
Originally Posted by Freyas
Overall, I'd say a R/Me Fragility build would be viable- you'd lose some efficiency in dealing damage via Fragility, but you can be more effective in the face of hex removal.
That's a pretty fair assement.
Cruel Skeksis
I am quite delighted to read the thread on potential builds.
As a per-order only GW devotee, I have had little chance to experiment with specialty builds, or even diverse builds that may incorporate a different secondary class. Because of that, it is a bit more abstract for me to imagine what it may be like to build a class one way as opposed to another, as I am very hands on. Reading the theme builds gives me a strong sense of what is possible with knowledge and a bit of monkeying around with ideas, instead of being stuck with the narrow learning of a few weekends of experience over more than that many months. Thanks for the article, a real eye opener to me on potentials in practice. Great read, I look forward to visiting this site more often! cpukilla
Does fragility pop when on fire is applied, and when it wears off? I heard that it did not, anyone know for sure?
Jak o
The reason I asked about if it works, is that I actually thought about a build very similar to this one. But when I tried it out, I couldn't get the damage output I wanted, so I thought the problem might have been with the on fire condition. I guess the problem was something else then.
I guess you can't talk about how you have tested this in alpha because of the NDA. If anyone tests this out in the bwe or have tested something like this earlier, could you please write here if you had any succes with damage output around 100 per seconds? Sleeky101
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jak o
The reason I asked about if it works, is that I actually thought about a build very similar to this one. But when I tried it out, I couldn't get the damage output I wanted, so I thought the problem might have been with the on fire condition. I guess the problem was something else then.
Possibly the build reset the "on fire" instead of waiting for it to pass (triggering fragility) and to start again (triggering fragility).
Pharalon
Quote:
Originally Posted by cpukilla
Does fragility pop when on fire is applied, and when it wears off? I heard that it did not, anyone know for sure?
Fragility will always trigger on both application and wearing off of any condition. However, the damage applied from a condition wearing off will not be displayed (you won't get a little "-28" popping up over their head), it just gets taken off their health bar.
Dreamsmith
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sleeky101
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Sleeky101
8+1 Energy Storage
8 + 1 = 9. 3 * 9 = 27. Break even comes on the third cast, not the fourth -- fourth and on is bonus.
Sleeky101
8,+1 rune, + 1mask- which I didn't take into account the first post. Sorry for complications.
Anyways, with the mark recharge thw way it is, mes/ele is probably the better way to go.
Zonzai
Here's a funky build I made just screwing around on the attribute calculator trying to come up with a farming toon.
The Mad Bomber Ne/El Soul Reaping 12+1 (Lucky 13 for a Nec) :twisted: Blood Magic 3 Death Magic 12+2 Glyph of Energy (elite) (Glyph) Your next spell costs 20 less energy to cast. This is an elite skill. Casting cost: 5 energy Casting time: 1 sec Recharge time: 15 sec Relevant attribute: None (Elementalist) and Glyph of Lesser Energy (Glyph) Your next spell cost 15 less energy to cast. Casting cost: 5 energy Casting time: 1 sec Recharge time: 30 sec Relevant attribute: None (Elementalist) Use these two spells to be able to keep building bombers and/or putrid explosion on new corpses. Animate Bone Minions (Spell) Exploit target corpse to animate two level 9 Bone Minions. Casting cost: 25 energy Casting time: 5 sec Recharge time: 5 sec Relevant attribute: Death Magic Use em to swarm and bomb your foes. Animate Bone Fiend (Spell) Exploit target corpse to animate a level 14 Bone Fiend. Bone Fiends can attack at range. Casting cost: 25 energy Casting time: 5 sec Recharge time: 5 sec Relevant attribute: Death Magic Throw one out every so often to keep continual nuking power going. Death Nova (Enchantment) For 30 seconds, if target ally dies, Death Nova deals 95 damage to all nearby creatures. Casting cost: 5 energy Casting time: 2 sec Recharge time: 0 sec Relevant attribute: Death Magic Use this very inexpensive spell to make your bombers go boom. Putrid Explosion (Spell) Target corpse explodes, sending out a shockwave that deals 114 damage to each nearby creature. Casting cost: 10 energy Casting time: 1 sec Recharge time: 0 sec Relevant attribute: Death Magic Use this one to make your bomber's targets go boom too. Taste of Death (Spell) Steal 380 health from target animated undead ally. Casting cost: 5 energy Casting time: 1 sec Recharge time: 0 sec Relevant attribute: Death Magic Use this spell to heal yourself while making your bombs go off. Dark Bond (Enchantment) For the next 36 seconds, whenever you receive physical damage, your closest minion suffers 75% of that damage for you. Casting cost: 10 energy Casting time: 2 sec Recharge time: 60 sec Relevant attribute: Blood Magic Use this one when the enemies start closing in on you. I know that the first concern everybody will have is energy. But, with every death, including your own pets', you get 13 energy. You can even kill one off using taste of death for 5 energy to heal yourself for 380 health and 8 energy (13 - 5). Limited by your number of minions but with no recharge time. The other part to this is using both energy glyphs. Suddenly you can turn out 2 level 9 bone minions for 10 energy every 15 or so seconds and two more for 15 energy every 30 seconds. But you will, as always, need corpses. And that is the weakness of this build. It doesn't work solo and it doesn't work too hot for pvp. However, with a healer and a couple of tanks you could potentially wipe out an entire armada of mobs - regardless of how many there are. I'm not going to say that this is the be-all end-all of pve builds but I will say that it seems like it would be a pretty damn fun build. And that's good.
walder
I saw a build like yours that it a little less minion and a little more damage but the same general idea. Energy could be a big problem in this build:
Nec/R Soul Reaping 9 Curses 11 Death 10 Marksmanship 10 Mark of Pain Animate Bone Minions Charm Animal Death Nova Dual Shot Barrage-E Taste of Death Revive Animal This build has a good base but there are some big flaws. First, is Soul Reaping 1:1 or 1:1.5? If it's 1:1 then it will be a little rough to use Minions even though the energy cost will be the same (2 minions * 9 en each = 18 = 6 net energy loss// 1 minion * 9 en = 9 = 6 net energy loss). Barrage seems a little out of place, I was thinking getting a Glyph of Energy necklace for Bone Minions instead. Then it costs 5 energy to cast and you will gain 13 energy instead of losing 6. But most importantly, whats the ruling on the Soul Reaping ratio?
Zonzai
1 for 1. And with two minions you would (as far as I know) get it twice.
Zonzai
Here's a build I'd like to try. It's quite possibly worth actually trying out. The truly important stuff is in bold. I'll let youput the pieces together.
Class: Ranger / Mesmer Assumed items: +1 to Expertise +2 to Marksmanship Attributes: (cost) Expertise: 9+1 (48) Beast Mastery: 3 (6) Marksmanship: 10+2 (61) Illusion Magic: 9 (48) Inspiration Magic: 8 (37) Total attribute points used: 200/200 Skills: 1) Fragility - (15,1,15) For 16 seconds, target foe takes 22 damage each time that foe suffers or recovers from a new condition. 2) Read the Wind - (5,2,12) For 12 seconds, your arrows move faster than normal and deal 15 extra damage. 3) Incendiary Arrows (elite) - (5,2,24) For 8 seconds, targets struck by your arrows are interrupted and set on fire for 1 seconds. This is an elite skill. 4) Called Shot - (10,0,4) Shoot an arrow that moves 3 times faster than normal and cannot be blocked or evaded. 5) Power Shot - (15,0,3) If Power Shot hits, you strike for +34 damage (before armor). 6) Pin Down - (10,0,10) If Pin Down hits, your target is crippled for 13 seconds. 7) Ether Feast - (5,2,8) Target foe loses 5 energy. You are healed 19 for each point of energy lost. 8) Lightning Reflexes - (10,0,60) For 9 seconds, you have a 75% chance to evade melee and arrow attacks, and you attack 33% faster.
Sausaletus Rex
#3 is now live. This time around things are a bit different as Freyas attempts to build not just one character but 8 from scratch. That's right, you get a full team build this time around and thanks to the BWE you also can get some insight on exactly how it worked out. The basic idea - and it's not a bad one - is to win a GvG match quick by carving up the Guild Lord with Grenth's Balance (Also known as Chiron's Balance. Who's supposed to be updating the skills around here, anyway? :P).
Freyas
I just wanted to add that I decided to put up a team build this week, mostly to give an idea of what to look for when trying to make up a build for a certain situation: in this case, guild battles. The build was extremely fun to play, getting my adrenaline pumping harder than pretty much any other time I've played. Team builds are a bit different than other builds, since each character can depend on benefits given by other players- for example, you can pack your character with more energy-intensive skills and less energy management if you know that one of your teammates is going to be bringing Blood is Power. In this build, most of the characters would not be extremely effective on their own, but when put together, the combination was fairly powerful.
Zrave
Two points
1) Does Heal Party have the same range as Order of the Vampire? Could be a nice way of healing the assassins from afar. 2) As for Phoenix on the E/mo, do the elementalists protecting the guild lord still cast maelstrom? I recall they did a while ago, and I had very little success with Phoenix.
Ensign
Heal Party had 'radar' range last time I checked the skill, which admittedly was a while ago. Not quite something that's going to help the hit squad.
Peace, -CxE
Freyas
Quote:
Originally Posted by Zrave
Two points
1) Does Heal Party have the same range as Order of the Vampire? Could be a nice way of healing the assassins from afar. 2) As for Phoenix on the E/mo, do the elementalists protecting the guild lord still cast maelstrom? I recall they did a while ago, and I had very little success with Phoenix. 1) We tested Heal Party, and it only has radar range- the healer would have to be at the front gates of the guild hall or a bit closer in order for the assassins to recieve the benefits. Heal Party and Aegis were skills I was hoping to use, but had to be dropped after we tried them out. 2) Phoenix was slightly difficult to cast- we had the best results having the E/Mo stand back a ways at the beginning to drop Meteor Shower and Firestorm, then come up next to the Guild Lord, at about the time that Maelstorm was running out. Phoenix was likely unnecessary- I'm not sure exactly how many times the E/Mo actually ended up using much more than Meteor Shower before the lord died- it was seriously under 10 seconds between when we started attacking and when we finished off the Lord.
Sausaletus Rex
We were discussing this build on IRC a few nights ago and I think some good points were brought up.
Firstly, the assassin or stealth team is a bit problematic. An Elmo is a curious choice, it makes sense given that you want to toss around a lot of nukes but why do you want to toss around a lot of nukes in the first place? Your build is centered around dropping the Lord as quickly as possible but by combining an Elementalist with your two Warriors you're not taking advantage of the boost to damage they'll get from the Orders and everything else. Another physical damage dealing character would seem to further increase your DPS meaning it'll take even less time than it already does to kill the Lord. Clearly, a healer is called for but given that you're running Energizing Winds to reduce energy costs couldn't a RaMo or WaMo serve to cast Healing Seed and your other buffs just as well? Or perhaps a Mo/R or Mo/W? Personally, I'd take a RaMo and concentrate on a lot of quick, cheap attack skills. Also, "Charge!" seems like a bit of a waste of an elite slot. True, you do want your team moving quickly but there are a lot of chokepoints, such as opening the gate where you'll have to slow down and more important than reaching the guild hall quickly is reaching it unnoticed by the other team. I'd merely stick Sprint on the charcter lugging the Thief so you can get a head start on opening the gate before the rest of the assassin's arrive and then use that opened elite slot for yet another Grenth's Balance. After all, if two are good, 3 should be even better. Instead of having to deal with a character with 900 odd hit points, you'll deal with one around 4 or 500. With no one healing the Lord and three dedicated damage dealers, you shouldn't have much of a problem whittling that away in a matter of seconds. Secondly, there's the question of what happens when that gambit fails? Your decoy team is set up to support that assassin team but it's not set up to do much else. As your article says, you had problems when you got into a slug fest with someone or ran up against a team that stuck to their base. The strategy is a good one, yes, it works, but the question is just how much can you pare it down and then include another, different, fall-back strategy that will serve to further increase your odds of winning. Since the best thing to do is to fine-tune your assassin's to be as deadly as possible the obvious solution, then, is to include some redundancy in your decoy team. Simply put, if the assassin's fail the decoy team needs to be able to put up enough of a fight that the game isn't over. It needs to be built to take advantage of a lot of the things that are going into your assassin group's success. You're going to have Energizing Winds up, you're going to have the Orders working for you, that, to me, seems to indicate a secondary strategy based around dealing physical damage supported by high cost magic. You need to be throwing around things like expensive Elementalist hexes like Mark of Rodgort/Glimmering Mark or some costly Nec debuffs because with Winds you can afford it. Next, you need to worry not about what happens when the opposing team retreats so much. Muddy Terrain seems like a waste of DP because of its casting time. You dont' want to cast it too early or else it'll impede your assassins but with a 5 second casting time it makes it hard to slam on the second the enemy starts running for their gate. Instead of trying to slow the opponent as they head for their gate, why not try and carve them up? Your decoy team should be ready to rush in after the enemy team as they make a U turn in the middle. If they're moving that means their casters aren't healing, that means that even with just 5 characters you can be wrecking some havoc among them as they withdraw and perhaps even slip inside their base after they've opened it up. Use their preoccupation with the assassin team against them, in other words. Make them have to choose between dealing with the assassins and dealing with the decoy team. Also, the suggestion was made that another way of doing a Lord gank would be to play possum a bit. Lay low in your hall or make a stab at the middle and then try and lure the enemy inside your gates. Then, have the assassins take offf for the hall with the theif and hope that your decoy team can hold them off for the few seconds it'll take them to kill the Lord or that the enemy will be too preoccupied with storming your gates to worry about their and too far away to be able to respond in time. I have my reservations about such a scheme but I'd like to hear your thoughts on the matter.
Freyas
We chose the ElMo because the damage that they could drop with meteor shower and firestorm on the guild lord who won't move out of the radius was greater than what a melee character could do, especially one that had to take some healing. With each Grenth's, the damage that it will deal is halved- two seemed sufficient to drop the lord enough- the third would have been dealing 100-200 damage at most- still not inconsiderable, but less than dropping a meteor shower does. A W/Mo might be a possibility, but with 2 W/Mo's having to take the brunt of the healing, there's not too much healing potential there with their low energy pool and slow regeneration.
Charge! is a possible skill to remove for something else- the increased run speed was nice, but I'm not sure if it's worth the elite slot- we ended up waiting for the guild thief, as it was often difficult to get him affected by it- if Charge! even works on the NPC's. One thought was replacing that with Lingering Curse to help prevent the other team from saving their lord even if they made it back- 1/2 healing and no enchantments should give a few extra seconds to finish the lord off even with the other team getting close enough to heal. Making the decoy team more viable in terms of fighting it out is something that I'd like to work on with the build. If fighting a team that you've already encountered, they're not going to let your gank squad get off an attack- you'll have to force the advantage. The biggest improvement I can see is adding some additional healing and damage-dealing in place of some snares on the decoy team- that way if you have to fight head-on 8vs8, you should have a viable team. As for Muddy Terrain, that wasn't a problem with Teamspeak. When the assassins neared the enemy resurrect pad, they'd call for Muddy Terrain, and they'd be in position by the time that the ritual was active. I would have to say that Muddy Terrain was easily the most effective snare that we had along, especially seeing as it prevents the use of speed buffs that the opposing team could use to rescue their hero. As for waiting, the biggest benefit I could see would be if we can manage to wipe the enemy at the flagstand by using all 8 players, or at least finish off the healers. One consideration I had was to send all 8 up towards the flagstand with the assassins hanging around at the back of the group- once battle is joined, they could break off and go around back. The problem with this is that the decoy team is stuck in the middle of a 5vs8 battle, and when fighting any skilled team, the decoy team is going to be in serious trouble with the odds stacked against them that much. Having more damage to try to kill some of the enemy players while they try to run might help out on the decoy team, but waiting for the first rush isn't beneficial unless the enemy team may be expecting the asssassination attempt. One thing that we've been trying to use to make the build more viable is to have less reliance on the guild thief. Skills like Necrotic Traversal might be able to allow the team access to the guild hall without the thief- though they'll need to get a corpse inside the hall. However, this could give the possibility of faking the opponents by sending a bogus squad out with the thief along one path while the real assassins make an assault from a different direction. Opposing guilds may be lulled into a false sense of security after taking out your thief, and decide to make an assault. However, this strategy would definately require some large ranged damage in order to finish off an archer to use their corpse to get into the guild hall, and would increase the time enough that the enemy could easily respond and get to your assassin squad if they have an idea of what you're doing. The biggest problem with making an assault while the enemy is in your guild hall is that they will often realize the danger and kill your guild thief- which generally makes it impossible to get into their base. Necrotic traversal could possibly allow your assassins to get out of the hall without the thief, and if the other team doesn't follow(as they've killed the thief), you just have to get inside their hall and kill their lord before they can manage to take out yours. Setting up the catapult and firing into your own base could help give your opponents the sense that the people that headed outside aren't a danger(one of the melee characters could do this, while the others are working on dispatching an archer to teleport inside).
semantic
Just wanted to throw up a big BOOYAH on that build and the writeup. Seriously, the writeup is stellar and the strat is hilarious, evil and mass inventive.
Darc.Syde
Quote:
Originally Posted by semantic
Just wanted to throw up a big BOOYAH on that build and the writeup. Seriously, the writeup is stellar and the strat is hilarious, evil and mass inventive.
ya, we took the build to highest was 6th place on ladder. then we went in for more and got killed by Fi, nO, and club G i think.
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